Why Applebee’s is turning its customers into marketers

Subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, check us out on Spotify and hear us on Stitcher. This is our RSS feed. Tell a friend! Joel Yashinsky is chief marketing officer at Applebee’s. The following conversation was excerpted from an interview for Ad Age’s Marketer’s Brief podcast. Applebee’s has a new campaign called “The Regulars,” featuring testimony from real customers. How did you decide this was the right approach at this time? Joel Yashinsky: As we travel and visit restaurants across the country, and talk to our team members and our bartenders, every one of our restaurants have regulars that are there on a daily or a weekly basis, or maybe for lunch two or three times a week, and they all have these great relationships with our restaurants and team members. And it became apparent to us there was something to that authenticity of having these real guests being featured in an ad that ties the story of our history for the last 41 years in a way that brings an authentic nature and feel. We’re really proud of this work. Customer testimonials are something of a quaint notion in advertising today, where it seems some brands won’t do anything that’s not considered a cultural breakthrough. Was there debate about whether this work was outstanding enough? We think it is because it’s real. That’s important especially with what we’re all dealing with on a day-to-day to basis. I think people aren't looking for gimmicks; they’re looking for reality. They’re looking for a taste of normalcy. These regulars that we feature—small business owners, veterans, local softball and basketball teams, firefighters—these are the real people of the world, and that’s what people are looking for. And as we come out of these COVID environments, I think people will enjoy experiencing the little things in life, the moments that take your day up from 5 or 6 to a 7 or 8. That’s what we try to provide to guests in our restaurants. We think this kind of campaign will resonate with people … they will see themselves or their neighbors in a way that makes them feel good, and lets them see an opportunity to get away from the everyday challenges we all face. Where did you find these guests? They are regular people, but they have extraordinary stories that you're able to convey in only a few seconds. There’s the veteran, the single guy who comes in and befriends the bartender, and the parents of an autistic child. Where did you find them and how did you get them to cooperate? We wanted to represent what happens in our restaurants every day, so we went into one of our markets. It happened to be Pittsburgh, but it could have been Kansas City or Dallas or Detroit. We talked to our restaurant general managers and the bartenders. We found these stories are very accessible because they were happening every day. We walked with them, and they were excited to be a part of it. What really came to life as we shot the work was that they were so natural. We gave them almost no direction, just asked them to interact with real servers, real bartenders and the real people who work in our restaurants. It all came together in way that was so magical. That led to us to think going forward how we could use more real guests in our work in the future. Last time we talked, Applebee’s had just launched its first NFT promo. What interested you in that, and what have you learned? I have to give a shout out to our agency, Grey, who thought up “The Regulars” with us as well as the NFT opportunity. As we looked at the zeitgeist, we saw something happening with NFTs where we thought, if we can find a way in that brings it to life that makes sense for Applebee’s, then we would explore it. The idea to bring a real-world experience, giving the product associated with the art to the person who won it. We did not invest a lot into it, but we saw the opportunity to be part of the conversation about what’s happening in the world today, and bring it to life in a way that was real for Applebee’s. And so we’ll continue to bring Metavese Mondays forward in 2022. We learned there is something engaging about NFTs that a certain part of the world is really interested in. We thought we could bring it to life in a way that tied our brand in appropriately. And we made sure we did it the right way. We didn’t look to make a profit on the sales, we were looking to support the artist that creates the NFT and bring an experience in our restaurants to win free food for a year, tied to that piece of art. We’ll continue to take the learnings from the first three Metaverse Mondays and bring forward new iterations that will engage people and bring excitement to the brand in a way that we hadn’t been focused on in the past. We want to have fun and be timely with the activities in the metaverse. Read more: How brands are using NFTs—a continually updated list Let’s talk about Walker Hayes. Where were you when you realized that he made a single, “Fancy Like,” that was racing up the charts and celebrated the pleasures of an Applebee’s date night? It was a great month-long experience. The song was released and someone sent it to me. I watched the song and then did a follow-up interview [with Hayes] where he said he’d always wanted to write a song about Applebee’s. And within a couple of weeks, his daughter created a dance with him on TikTok. I remember being at home with my daughters. And my oldest daughter, who’s 21, said, “Dad you got to see this dance, it’s all over TikTok.” I was just starting to pay attention to TikTok. All of a sudden, it was going wild. I think it magically ties into “The Regulars” work we’ve done because Walker Hayes is a regular. He’s a regular who happens to be a country music artist who created the song of the summer in 2021, but the song was a hit because it’s so real. It has a true insight about the Applebee’s brand. And he’s speaking about it as a fan of the brand. He is exactly right about who we are. We’re proud that we’re “Fancy Like Applebee’s.” And we were able to work with Walker and bring his song to life in a way that was really engaging for our guests. We worked very quickly with him and his team to partner together in a way that was real and authentic. It was critically important this wasn’t some forced promotion. We had taken the Oreo shake off our menu during COVID. And all of a sudden, the song is rising up the charts like a rocket and we said, “we need to figure out how to get Oreo Shakes back into our restaurants.” He’s really proud of that, and has said he is looking forward to telling his grandkids about it. @walkerhayesofficial #fancylike ♬ Fancy Like - Walker Hayes Not everyone is a fan of country music. Did you give any consideration that you might be coming up against a cultural divide? It wasn’t really a concern. Because people were looking for those moments that are real and natural and bring back moments of joy and happiness. With TikTok and the dance, people of all different backgrounds were participating. As we showed in our ad, and can see on TikTok with tens of thousands of people posting dances—a lot of them in front of our restaurants—there were people from a wide swath of America, and that’s who we featured in our ad. The song spoke beyond any one demographic. It spoke to everyone with its base level of joy. That was the magic of the song. I was speaking with a restaurant industry analyst recently who said that although dining rooms are open again and customers are happy with the quality of the food, the total experience scores from consumers on casual dining restaurants just aren’t where they used to be yet. What has Applebee's experienced? I’m so proud of the work our team did, from franchisees and their teams to our organization, from operational, culinary, off-premise, everyone worked together to be sure we could bring the experiences back that people were looking for. That led to really great results. We saw a resurgence in our brand that was building prior to the pandemic, but we made sure to make the experience as great as possible. And from a marketing standpoint, we're trying to make the ease of that experience as good as possible through delivery or to-go. I think we’ve done a great job making sure people felt safe and comfortable, and our guests responded. As you look out the restaurant or consumer goods fields, what brands, campaigns or ideas have you seen that you admire? The ads that capture attention are those that can provide a little bit of joy. The Progressive work with Dr. Rick and parentology makes me laugh every time I see it. The simple approach of the Heinz ketchup work in terms of people drawing ketchup—I thought that simplicity was great work. And I think the work that McDonald’s has done has been great. Their celebrity work is different than ours, but what they have done with those celebrity orders has been pretty interesting.

Why Applebee’s is turning its customers into marketers

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